If You Asked Me To (3:54)

“If You Asked Me To” is a song written and originally released as the lead single for Patti LaBelle’s seventh solo studio album, entitled Be Yourself, and for the James Bond 007 motion picture Licence to Kill soundtrack. The song is a ballad written by critically acclaimed songwriter Diane Warren. The lyrics are from the point of view of a woman who pleads to her significant other.

“If You Asked Me To” was first featured on the soundtrack of the 1989 James Bond movie, Licence to Kill. LaBelle’s version peaked at number 79 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, at number 10 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, and at number 11 on the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks.

The music video was filmed shortly after Jacqueline “Jackie” Padgett died of lung cancer at age 43, and just one day after her funeral. (She was the third of Patti LaBelle’s sisters to die; all three of Patti’s sisters died before age 44.) As such, the context of the song changed dramatically, as a mourning LaBelle, dressed in black, sings the song in a church (with candles and mourning lilies), intercut with shots of her in tears.

Despite being a Top 10 hit on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts, the song did not crossover to the pop charts until Céline Dion covered it three years later. Regarding the subject, LaBelle once explained during an interview used for the liner notes of her 1999 Greatest Hits album what she believed to be the reason for this fact: “I knew the song was a hit when I recorded it, and I was happy that Celine did it and did so well with it.